Thursday 5th May is a day that is in the UK most associated with elections of some sort, and today the surrounding areas of Liverpool went to the polls to cast their ballot, however Liverpool itself… did not. What does that have to do with Bill Bailey? Nothing except he kept referring to “Liverpool and the Surrounding Areas” throughout the show. Seeing Bill Bailey has been on my personal bucket list now for years. He is an accomplished musician and an extremely clever guy who just happens to embody good comedy in an ‘old rockers’ body.

Oddly I felt no anxiety in the build up to this event tonight. I am not sure if that was a true feeling of not being scared of attending or not wanting to attend, but either way it build up to a point of either being unexcited to be attending or not really classing it as ‘an experience’ because it didn’t involve traveling outside of the City. I am at this point, not sure which it was. But what it meant was that I was able to travel to the venue (via an Uber) without negative anticipation intruding into my thoughts. I felt free enough to simply go and enjoy the event. I arrived to the arena early, before 6:45pm and of course the doors were not open as yet. So I decided to have a little walk down by the river. The sun was out and so were some people. I paused for a few minutes to take some photographs.

I enjoyed the little walk I had. It was sunny and wasn’t cold at all, there was very little wind if any down at the river and I felt calm being out. I walked passed the riverside of the arena (which let me scout out potential ways to get inside when the doors did open), and it still not quite being that time I decided to head over towards the Albert Dock where there was an empty bench awaiting me. I sat down and felt really chilled out, happily sitting there watching the people rushing by. I took the opportunity to take a photograph of the Arena itself.

Damn lampost in the way of course. I stayed on the bench till shortly after 7pm when I started to notice small hordes of people entering the building through its various entrances. I started to make my way over to the cityside of the Arena (which was a good call because that’s the entrance I needed. I spoke briefly with a steward to confirm I was in the right place and queued up for the metal detectors. Waited my turn and passed through. Nothing bleeped, no search was conducted and I was inside. The thing that hit me first (as in all the years the Arena has been in the City, I’ve never actually been inside it before today), was the heat. The glass frontage surrounding the building combined with the sun and the many many people scurrying around didn’t help. I found the toilets and the bars. (Not as many as I expected… Bar’s that is, not toilets, of which there were plenty). I started looking for the door I needed to get to the seat block I was in.. and noted that my seat block was block D… yet all the signs lead to numbered blocks…

I walked around for a few minutes and then decided to queue up for a drink… As a surprise to myself I came away with nothing more than a bottle of water! Found the right door and headed into the house. My seat was on the floor rather than in any of the upper or lower tiers, so I was straight down the stairs to the bottom, and down to row G, only some seven rows from the stage, and my seat was number one. Right on the left hand side, on the end. Perfect. Legroom was fine anyway because they were floor seats. In front of me was a large screen where the stage was being broadcast to anyway, so if I did have issues seeing Bill in person, he’d be there on the screen anyway.

I think it was around 7:30pm when I had found my seat and sat down. It was pretty empty when I arrived and I could see already a good few folks there on their own like me, regardless it wasn’t bothering me tonight. Sure I had to get up a few times to let people past and into their seat, but once the row was full on my end, that was it. The view from the seat was good, see photograph below, though taken while the venue was fairly empty. It did fill up, but for the most part I could see through the gaps between people, and for the bits I couldn’t, as I say the screen was right there.

The show itself was entitled “En route to Normal” and was titled prior to the 2020 CoVID Pandemic and associated lockdowns. The show itself was due to be performed back in 2020 but was a victim of the cancellations and postponements of that year, so in many ways I was lucky to get a ticket to the show at all, most of it selling out to people who’d bought their tickets for the original date of the performance. Bill came to the stage promptly just after 8pm and performed for around an hour before taking a break. After which he returned to the stage to do another hour and a couple of encores at the end. All in all the performance finished just before 11pm. I think it was worth the ticket price for the amount to time Bill was on stage for. The show was full of monologues and long-setup jokes infused with musical interludes and some audience participation throughout. It was a really good performance, I thought he played well. Literally just like he is on TV. It was strange to see him perform ‘in person’ but definitely a performer I would go back and see again. There were bits that were funnier than others for sure, but comedy, don’t you think is relative.. It’s going to hit people differently. For example, the guy sitting next to me started by sitting there unreactive to anything, and by the end he was belly-laughing along with the rest of us. It was funny hearing the laughter and banter from the crowd too… I’ve never been to a comedy show before, but I liked the atmosphere and I’d definitely look for more comedy shows in the future. But I have to say… the guy next to me… just didn’t clap, at all. Everyone around him did, but nothing that Bill did could get him to clap. Different folks, different strokes… I just found it somewhat disrespectful towards the artist. I think he was quite shy looking back at things, but I always think I am ‘the shyest person around’ so I am surprised when others are more so than I am. (Yeh I was surprised to be ‘wooing’ and apparently.. I have a loud clap! But I like to show my appreciation when I see something worthy of appreciation.

After the final encore when the lights went up, so did the audience, literally everybody seemed to stand together, and tried to leave.. together. Lots of pushing through – pointless. (Obviously wanting to get to their car two seconds before the next person)… but still having to queue to get out of the car park… I took my time. I ideally like to remain behind in a venue after the end of a show, and if I wasn’t on the end, I guess I would have. But I took my time exiting the house then the venue itself. It was funny watching the hordes trying to get into the car park. I ordered my Uber and went and stood back down at the riverside. So calm, so still. Took some more photos, really wasn’t cold at all. Uber arrived and off home I went.

Anyway… Bill Bailey… Check. See again? For sure!